For the past several months, I've been making a series of YouTube videos showing my romance novel collection -- or, as has been the case lately, simply showing the books that I've acquired since the previous video. I enjoy doing those videos, primitive as they are (shot on my cellphone's camera as-is, with no post-production editing whatsoever), but admittedly they do feel a bit random.
Recently I thought about doing a second series of videos where I would talk about the romance novel genre in general, particularly its history, and I figured that "History of the Romance Novel (episode one)" had a nice ring to it.
However, judging from my previous videos, it seems like the first episode of any series is the one that receives the most views and comments. And I suspected that someone who watched a "History of the Romance Novel (episode one)" would expect to see a general overview of the genre's history -- at least on that inaugural episode of the series. If I failed to do so, viewers would probably be disappointed and understandably so.
Putting together a timeline of romance history was daunting and sounded like a lot of work. But it also sounded like something that was definitely needed, since there didn't seem to be many videos on YouTube giving an overview of the genre's history, as I noted in a previous blog post. So, yes, a lot of work -- but the result would hopefully fill a void, be useful and worth the effort.
As mentioned above, though, my video skills are primitive. I did find a free site (Adobe Spark) that allows the creation of short videos. They put a watermark in the bottom right corner of the video, and a slide at the very end of the video, but I could live with that. The site was fairly user-friendly despite the massive amount of images that I uploaded to make the video. Originally I thought about providing a voiceover to the images as they flashed on the screen, but in the end I used a piece of music offered on the site. When I was done tinkering with the video and basically satisfied with the results, I was able to download the final version as an mpeg and then upload it to YouTube. Mission accomplished!
Initially I was going to cover the entire history of the genre in the first episode, as can be seen from the folders on my computer as I worked on the video:
But it soon became clear that I had better split the episodes into various eras, in chronological order. So, this first episode (which you can view above, or watch on YouTube) covers the genre from 1740 (Pamela by Samuel Richardson) to 1977 (when Johanna Lindsey's first novel, Captive Bride, was published). I figured that would be a good place to stop the first installment, to sort of set the stage for all the rest to follow.
It's possible that the episode contains some errors or glaring omissions. If so, I welcome corrections and suggestions. Also, Adobe Spark is free to use, so if you think I should have done it differently, feel free to create your own video telling the story the way that you think it ought to be told. If I can make a video, then practically anyone else can, too.
My plan is for Episode Two to begin around 1973 with the debut of Harlequin Presents and then show how Harlequin expanded throughout the 1970s and 1980s. (I might use 1989 as the end-point for that episode.) The video will also show the rise of various category romance lines (Silhouette, Candlelight Ecstasy, Second Chance at Love, Loveswept) as well as more obscure lines (MacFadden, Sapphire) that competed with Harlequin at the time.
That's a lot to cover in one episode, so Episode Three will likely show what was happening during the same period (late 1970s and the 1980s) in the historical romance field. I also want to spend some time looking at the rise and fall of the traditional Regency lines, which may have to wait until Episode Four. Future episodes will continue the timeline of the genre's history from the 1990s to the present. (That's assuming I have enough time to devote to working on them.)
- SHOW NOTES:
You may be wondering where all the various images shown in the video originated. The answer is that some book covers were scanned from my own copies, while others were taken off the internet after a Google search. A few were ones I had saved several months ago from eBay auctions I had seen (such as the photo which opens the video of a whole bunch of books scattered on the floor, taken from an old eBay auction).
The notes below have the minute and second mark listed at the beginning of each paragraph to make it easier to find the place in the video being discussed.
(0:32 - 1:12) The Jane Austen (except for the Pride and Prejudice title page), Bronte sisters, and Scarlet Pimpernel paperback books shown in the video are from my own copies.
(1:02) The Hawthorne's "scribbling women" quote is from the JSTOR site (I added the highlighted words to make it easier to see). This slide may seem a bit out of place, but my intention was to show that the bias against romance novels, and popular novels written by women, is a long-standing prejudice.
In an early version of the video, I followed the "scribbling women" slide with another slide showing an example of a novel from 1892 (shown above), but I haven't read that novel myself and wasn't sure it ought to be included. I wanted to show some examples of romance novels from the 19th century, as well as more examples from the early 20th century, but I'm less knowledgeable about those eras than from the 1960s-on. But perhaps they will be examined in a future episode at some point.
(1:18) The image shown in the slide for the 1908 founding of Mills & Boon is actually from the cover of Sara Seale's 1944 novel House of Glass (reprinted by Harlequin as Maggy). The image was taken from this blog, and you can read more about the novel there. Apparently Mills & Boon was founded in 1908, but didn't publish their first book until the following year.
Speaking of Sara Seale, one thing that surprised me when making this video was how little is known about her. Her Wikipedia entry begins: "Sara Seale was the pseudonym by Mary Jane MacPherson (d. 11 March 1974) and/or A.D.L. MacPherson (d. 30 October 1978), a British writing team..." However, a biographical entry on the back cover of a later reprint (after her death), which was posted on a Betty Neels Facebook group, refers only to one person, not a "team." And both named MacPherson? -- were they sisters? a married couple? Not knowing for sure, in the slide about Sara Seale in my video (during the Harlequin section at 10:09) I decided to list only the best known information, which is that her real name was Mary Jane MacPherson and that she died in 1974 (per the death record document linked on the Wikipedia page). I think the fact that this is a mystery is another example of how unexplored and ignored the romance genre's history is.
(2:03) I was made aware last year of Love Story Magazine when reading "Charting the Course of Romantic Fiction" by Mary Anne Landers, an article in Romantic Times #100 (July 1992). In my Romantic Times index, I wrote: "This is a 6-page article about the romance genre which may be a good introduction to the genre's history (at least up to 1992), despite a few errors (for example, Harlequin Presents debuted in 1973, not 1975). Landers marks the beginning of the genre as 1919 when "the first romance pulp magazine, Love Stories, premiered." This puts romance more in line with science fiction, where many fans cite the debut of Amazing Stories magazine in 1926 as the genre's start. However, Landers makes two errors here: the magazine was called Love Story Magazine (not Love Stories) and it began in 1921, not 1919."
(2:13) The Elinor Glyn and Berta Ruck images shown in the video are scans I made from my copies of Barbara Cartland's Library of Love, a 1970s series of paperbacks published by Bantam Books where Cartland "condensed" these early novels for the modern reader. These happen to be the only four books in that series which I own. Here's how I have them listed in my list of my romance novel collection:
(3:20) The beautiful Pocket Books edition of Gone With the Wind (with Clark Gable on the cover) is my own copy. The cover of Rebecca shown is also a scan from my copy.
(3:31) You can watch the 1946 movie version of Dragonwyck on YouTube.
(3:37) It only occurred to me during the making of this video that the Life of Riley episode about a racy historical novel called My Lady Jezebel is parodying the controversy over Forever Amber. You can hear the 1950 radio version starring William Bendix here (which I prefer) or the 1950 television version starring a pre-Honeymooners Jackie Gleason here (they use the same script).
(3:43) The Frances Parkinson Keyes covers are taken from my own copies. I've only read one of her books, Once on Esplanade. It was one of the 61 novels that I read last year (you can find the blog entry showing my reviews of all 61 books here). The Georgette Heyer, Barbara Cartland, D. E. Stevenson and Denise Robins books shown are also from my own copies. I have two of the three Alice Chetwynd Ley books shown; the cover image of The Master and the Maiden was found online.
(5:13) The website of the Romantic Novelists' Association is https://romanticnovelistsassociation.org/
Due to space limitations, I didn't mention that Barbara Cartland was the group's first vice president. Incidentally, this reminds me that I totally forgot to mention British historical author Catherine Cookson (1906-1998). I don't think her books got popular in the U.S. until the 1980s, however, so I can use that as an excuse!
(5:20) Woman's Weekly Library and the other U.K. digest-size fiction magazines may have been more of a 1960s phenomena, so they may be chronologically a bit off (preceding the 1950s nurse novel trend in the video). The images shown for those magazines were scans I made from an issue I had at one point (but no longer do). Leslie Lance was a pen-name for Irene Mossop, who also wrote as Theresa Charles (mentioned in the Gothic romance section of the video at 8:49).
(5:37-6:11) Most of the nurse novel images were found online, with the exception of the Peggy Gaddis, Sharon Heath and all except one of the Arlene Hale books which are from my own copies. You can read more about Peggy Gaddis here.
(6:17) The two Gardner Fox covers are from the Gardner Francis Fox Library website, where you can read many of his old novels in their entirety, including these ones, as well as the 1970s romantic suspense novels that he wrote for Signet/NAL under the pen-name Lynna Cooper.
(6:39) The Angelique cover is from this website which shows the covers of all the U.S. editions. In the 1970s, Bantam released paperback editions with numbers on the covers, which fits in with that "author branding" thing I mention near the end of the video.
(6.47) When Love Must Hide was another book that I read last year. I actually created the Goodreads entry for the book since none already existed. Its cover and those of the Dorothy Daniels books in the video are scanned from my copies.
(6:55) The covers of the Victoria Holt, Jean Plaidy, Philippa Carr books are scanned from my own copies. My Mistress of Mellyn appears to be a first edition of the Fawcett paperback from 1961. It would be interesting to know if there are any (or how many) earlier covers that depict the famous Gothic trope of the woman running away from the house at night.
(8:21) I've noticed that Elsie Lee's novels appear to be highly collectible, judging by the prices that many of them go for on eBay. (And not just her Gothic novels, a sub-genre which tends to be collectible anyway.)
(8:55) You can watch the TV movie version of Velda Johnston's A Howling in the Woods on YouTube. (I haven't watched it.)
(9:30) That huge stack of Harlequins is a photo I took in my living room in 2018. Here's an uncropped look:
(10:54) In March, archivist Steve Ammidown wrote a post about Roberta Leigh on his blog.
(11:24) Until April 1972, books in the Harlequin Romance line were released in the United States a few months after their Canadian publication. So, Anne Mather's first Harlequin release, The Arrogant Duke came out in December 1970 in Canada and March 1971 in the U.S. I've seen a Harlequin bio of Mather that said her first book came out in 1970, but it bears repeating that her first book, Caroline, came out in 1965. It was published by another U.K. company, Robert Hale, not Mills & Boon.
(11:57) You can read a review of The New Nurses at the Vintage Nurse Romance Novels blog.
(12:10) I have to admit that the 1967-1982 Candlelight Romance line, despite its sometimes erratic numbering system, is my all-time favorite category romance line because of its variety and willingness to include "intrigue" and historical novels.
(12:27) You can read more about Janet Louise Roberts here.
(12:47) The Reservation Nurse and Soul Nurse covers are from a page at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee website. The Marilyn Morgan, R.N. cover that I used in the video is from the same page. Steve Ammidown's blog has an article about the latter series and its author Rubie Saunders.
(13:05) The photo of the stacks of Barbara Cartland novels? Yep, another photo I took in my living room in 2018. Here's an unobstructed look:
(13:27) I assume that Iris Bromige is no longer alive, given that she was born in 1912, but I've not seen a death date listed online. If anyone has any info about that, let me know.
(13:33) The background image is taken from an extreme closeup of a scan of my copy of Cashelmara by Susan Howatch (1975 Fawcett edition of her 1974 novel). Here's the full cover:
(13:48) There's very little about Ann Forman Barron (who also wrote as Ann Barron) online, but when making this video, I did locate a photo of her final resting place here.
(13:54) I had thought about using this photo of Roberta Gellis somewhere in the video, but decided against it. It's taken from the November 13, 1981 issue of Publishers Weekly that had a special feature about romance novels.
(14:04) You can watch the first episode of the 1979 BBC TV mini-series of Penmarric on YouTube (unless it's been removed by the time you read this).
(14:12) The video probably makes too much of a jump from historical novels to Gordon Merrick's gay romance The Lord Won't Mind. The image of the two subsequent Avon books by Merrick are from a Twitter post.
(14:29) The photo of Kathleen E. Woodwiss is from the July 19, 1991 issue of Publishers Weekly.
(15:08) The photo of Laurie McBain is from the front inside cover of her novel Tears of Gold (1979). Below is a scan of the page:
Incidentally, as far as I know, Laurie McBain is still alive, although I recall reading online somewhere that fellow writer Shirlee Busbee was no longer in contact with her. (If I find the link again, I'll add it here.)
(15:27) One Jennifer Wilde book I have that I didn't show in the video is this 1992 Dell Books edition of a Gothic he wrote in 1975 under the pen-name Katherine St. Clair. Amusingly, there are two pen-names on the cover of this book (a similar situation to the "Philippa Carr is Victoria Holt" blurbs on the covers of her books).
(15:31) The video ends with just the mention that Johanna Lindsey's first book was published in 1977, without explaining her significance. That significance will be noted in a future episode (probably Episode Three) when I get to the 1980s when her popularity grew. And in fact Lindsey may be a more important figure in the history of the genre than Woodiwiss herself, at least in retrospect.
Well, that's all for now. Thanks for watching (and reading)!
